Page:On the connexion of the physical sciences (1834).djvu/31

Rh can be known from observation, since the existence of the human race has occupied comparatively but a point in duration, while these vicissitudes embrace myriads of ages. The proof is simple and convincing. All the variations of the solar system, secular as well as periodic, are expressed analytically by the sines and cosines of circular arcs, which increase with the time; and, as a sine or cosine can never exceed the radius, but must oscillate between zero and unity, however much the time may increase, it follows that when the variations have, by slow changes, accumulated, in however long a time, to a maximum, they decrease, by the same slow degrees, till they arrive at their smallest value, and again begin a new course, thus for ever oscillating about a mean value. This, however, would not be the case if the planets moved in a resisting medium, for then both the eccentricity and the major axes of the orbits would vary with the time, so that the stability of the system would be ultimately destroyed. The existence of such a fluid is now clearly proved; and although it is so extremely rare that hitherto its effects on the motions of the planets have been altogether insensible, there can be no doubt that, in the immensity of time, it will modify the forms of the planetary orbits, and may at last even cause the destruction